There are various reasons cited. Again, there's the decision not to import. Another is hoarding and price manipulation. There's also the fact that it's holiday season, although the price has already been rising for months. As a matter of fact, just 6 months ago, a kilo is only around $2. But of all the reasons cited, none is convincing enough.
This of course shouldn't be the reason but it would be for sure the cure!
To officially insist not to import even if the sufficiency level right at the source itself is 0% is absurd. That's an insensitive decision. Well, the rich leaders up there can't feel the shortage because they can have much of it regardless of the price.
Of course, importation would have to be balanced. Importing onions, which are much cheaper, could significantly affect local onion farmers. But at this time when even local producers have zero supply? When the price per kilo more than doubles the price of pork, beef, and whatever meat? This is simply ridiculous!
Good God keep us away from those rates of onion. I dont know but I cant digest that rate really. In my country (farm producer), that would be the market rate for entire carrot. Idk, a carrot would weigh around 20-25 kgs. Thats almost similar rate as to what @stompix mentioned in their post. Thats definitely alien onion. Plus there is no dish (almost) in my country which doesnt have onion in it. It would taste like Im eating an empty dish.
Anyways, yes there are issues around the globe, some countries are affected more than the other. But those rates are terrifying. By the way rest of the daily things are still normal in Asian countries. At least that is what news telling us.
You pray for good and responsible leadership instead! That is all there is to it. The price of ordinary red onions, not alien ones from Mars, rising too high is just a symptom of a worse illness.
Indeed, there is almost no dish without onions. Even an ordinary sauce here should have onions. Sadly, that's already history for many.
You can actually hunt for cheaper ones. But they're usually of lesser quality: small ones, old stock, starting to rot, and so on. Location is also a factor. But even at $11.62 per kilo, which this news article reports, it is still very expensive. For goodness' sake, we're already at the top even at $6.73 a kilo. But it didn't stop from there. It continued to rise.
And it's not just about inflation. This unbelievably fast rise could only happen intentionally.